Thought you guys might be interested in this short article. Not many details inside but the gist is that being distracted by emails and IM is damaging to our IQ. Interesting food for thought with the way IT has been going with making it easier and easier to get instant results from us.

This article is bad though... now all the stupid users at your job can blame their stupidity on the company. The last thing anyone in IT needs is one more excuse for the users to not have to own up to their own short-comings in the IQ department...

Just throwing a computer into a scenario can cause a reasonably intelligent person to lose 30 IQ points right off the top. Ive had a number of tickets over the years from medical doctors where the only issue was they couldnt figure out how to turn the computer on.

Distractions are annoying, but isn't the whole point of email to be a timeshifting system? Unless you're waiting on something specific to arrive in the next few minutes, this whole issue can be rendered moot by people checking their email maybe twice or three times a day at fixed times and turning off automatic notification.

I always thought that IQ was an attempt to measure one's propensity for intelligence or perhaps "ability to learn", using the best tools currently conceived of, by some self-thought-to-be intelligent psycologists of the distant past. One's ability to navigate and apply themself to daily tasks and the efficacy of performance while doing so, is certainly affected by not only their education, tools and IQ, but also by the extent and focus of their attention applied to such tasks. Distractions certainly diminish the quality and efficacy of task completion, but I wouldn't call that a diminished IQ, but a diminished work ethic.

Perhaps the real underlying issue is the apparent addiction to technology and increase in social media and opportunity that technology affords. I have observed incessant texting by the youth of today and an almost total addiction to social sites like facebook, Myspace, twitter, and etc. I believe this is an erosion to what I would consider to be professionalism and/or ethics in the work place.

This is only an accelleration from the days when the telephone (call waiting) or then cell phones (not the pda's of today) were the big distraction, not that long ago. To allow yourself to totally disrupt a conversation or meeting to take another call, text, check facebook, etc. is just plain rude and un-professional! It conveys that the current individual or conversation is not some-how worthy of your attention but are relegated to second or third place. I will often hang up unless the individual previously extends the courtesy of indicating that they are waiting for an importan phone call and may need to take the call if it comes. To me this practice is just an over indulgence and/or lack of control or professionalism. IMHO

The concept of "Email scheduling" really helps. You allocate only certain hours of your work day for answering e-mails (e.g. 8am-9am, 11am-12pm, 4pm-5pm) and at all other times your Outlook must be shut down to avoid distractions so you can do something useful :)

The concept of "Email scheduling" really helps. You allocate only certain hours of your work day for answering e-mails (e.g. 8am-9am, 11am-12pm, 4pm-5pm) and at all other times your Outlook must be shut down to avoid distractions so you can do something useful :)

That's an awesome concept for someone who doesn't have keep an eye out for help desk tickets.

The concept of "Email scheduling" really helps. You allocate only certain hours of your work day for answering e-mails (e.g. 8am-9am, 11am-12pm, 4pm-5pm) and at all other times your Outlook must be shut down to avoid distractions so you can do something useful :)

That's an awesome concept for someone who doesn't have keep an eye out for help desk tickets.

I hear what you are saying. A lot of my minute-to-minute work flows in via my E-mail. That's [probably why I so much trouble getting long-term stuff done.

That's ok. Some of our employees (some upper management) must be so concerned with their diminishing IQ's that they do not either read nor respond to email anyway. Frustrating culture. Maybe I should suggest that they start smoking pot.

The concept of "Email scheduling" really helps. You allocate only certain hours of your work day for answering e-mails (e.g. 8am-9am, 11am-12pm, 4pm-5pm) and at all other times your Outlook must be shut down to avoid distractions so you can do something useful :)

That's an awesome concept for someone who doesn't have keep an eye out for help desk tickets.

Yes, that's true. In this case e-mail is your primary work tool and in this case this concept simply doesn't not apply.